Leaders of ‘orgasmic meditation’ group convicted of coercion charges

New York: Two women whose company promoted “orgasmic meditation” as a tool of female empowerment were found guilty Monday of running a forced labour scheme in which they coerced vulnerable employees to perform degrading sex acts for little or no pay.

The convictions of the women, Nicole Daedone and Rachel Cherwitz, followed a five-week trial in which jurors heard testimony about sex acts rarely described in a courtroom.

As the verdict was read, Daedone, wearing a light-blue pantsuit, smiled and nodded, before embracing her lawyer, Jennifer Bonjean. Cherwitz, dressed in a black blazer, did not visibly react.

In the courtroom, Daedone was emotional as she addressed and embraced her supporters, many of whom continue to be connected to the company, OneTaste. About two dozen supporters packed the courtroom Monday, as many have since the trial began in early May.

Joseph Nocella Jr., the interim US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement that the verdict had “unmasked” Daedone and Cherwitz as “grifters who preyed on vulnerable victims.”

Both women are set to be sentenced in late September. Each faces up to 20 years in prison.

At a news conference outside the courthouse after the verdict, Bonjean said the defense planned to appeal.

Daedone, joining her outside the courthouse, said: “There is nothing but the spiritual aim that I set out for, and that’s the liberation of all people, and the liberation of women. I’ll do that wherever I am.”

The verdict suggested that jurors had embraced an expansive definition of “coercion.” Daedone and Cherwitz were not accused of blackmail or threats of violence or the loss of property, coercive acts that have defined previous prosecutions of leaders of sex cults and forced labor schemes.

Daedone started OneTaste in San Francisco in 2004. Her goal, she has said, was to address what she called the gap in sexual satisfaction between men and women. A former prostitute who has described growing up in an abusive household, Daedone says her teachings were inspired by traditional Buddhist practices.

OneTaste gained attention for its central practice, orgasmic meditation, or “OMing.” The act typically involved a gloved man systematically stroking the genitals of a woman as she lay in a butterfly position on an array of pillows for 15 minutes. Variants included “male OMing,” in which a woman stroked a man’s genitals for 15 minutes.

The company quickly became popular, with positive media coverage helping to fuel a membership surge. At its height, OneTaste had locations in Austin, Texas; Chicago; Denver; New York; and other cities. In New York, there were OneTaste events in neighborhoods such as Hell’s Kitchen and the West Village.

But as OneTaste grew in size and influence, accusations that the company was fostering an abusive work environment began to emerge. A 2018 article by Bloomberg Businessweek magazine was among the first signs that something might be amiss within the group.

The article contained accounts from former OneTaste employees who said they had run up substantial credit card debt to pay for courses and had worked for free while trying to pay off their debts. Several months after the article’s publication, the company closed its US locations but continued to operate in London for a short time.

In 2023, federal prosecutors in Brooklyn charged Daedone and Cherwitz, who joined OneTaste in 2007 and rose quickly to become head of sales, with one count of forced labor conspiracy apiece.

The women, prosecutors said, had recruited vulnerable women to join OneTaste, coerced them into paying for OneTaste’s expensive courses, which could run to five figures, and psychologically and sexually abused them.

The trial was a striking departure from the organised crime, terrorism and gang-related cases that often play out in Brooklyn’s federal courtrooms. Instead of charts showing connections between different members of a crime family, prosecutors displayed diagrams of human anatomy included in OneTaste manuals, as well as visual depictions of orgasmic meditation.

“I can get into more detail if you’d like,” Christopher Hubbard, a former website manager for the company, said while testifying about its sexual soirees.

“That’s OK,” replied Sean Fern, a prosecutor.

The testimony of more than a half-dozen women who worked for OneTaste was central to the government’s case. The women said the company had shaped their identities and that they believed leaving would end their path to enlightenment. Daedone, Cherwitz and other members had brainwashed them into thinking there was no life outside of OneTaste, these witnesses said.

Daedone, the witnesses said, had assigned “research partners” to practice orgasmic meditation together. Monogamous romantic relationships were discouraged, with OneTaste leaders breaking them up if they thought they were hurting members’ spiritual journeys.

The witnesses stopped short of accusing Daedone or Cherwitz of threatening violence or the loss of property if they left, which defense lawyers seized on. Those who worked for OneTaste had ultimately consented to an alternative lifestyle, the lawyers said, arguing that prosecuting the two women amounted to criminalising.

“You are not here to determine whether they violated some kind of standard of decency,” Celia Cohen, a lawyer for Cherwitz, told the jury during her closing argument.

Prosecutors were dealt a major blow before the trial began when they acknowledged that what was expected to be key evidence — supposed sections from a former OneTaste employee’s diaries — could not be considered authentic. The lead prosecutor, Gillian Kassner, left the case after the evidence was thrown out.

At OneTaste, the lines between consensual and forced work, which included sex work, were often blurred, according to prosecution evidence. Tasks ranged from cooking to having sex with OneTaste’s wealthiest investors, according to witness testimony. Employees were encouraged to engage in orgasmic meditation with as many people as they could, and mornings at OneTaste’s communal homes began with the practice.

Several witnesses testified that they had been routinely instructed to pleasure Daedone’s romantic partner sexually, including by having intercourse with him, whipping him and walking him on a leash. Residents of a communal OneTaste house in Harlem cleaned up after Daedone, who had her own room when she visited while others shared rooms and beds.

The women understood at the time, they testified, that such work was part of their jobs, as was engaging in “OM” sessions with men they did not find attractive. They said they had agreed to engage in the behavior because they wanted to stay tethered to OneTaste and not run afoul of Daedone.

Daedone, according to videos shown by prosecutors at the trial, preached that orgasmic meditation could free women from past sexual trauma and that they could avoid such trauma altogether if they were always in the mood for sex.

“The real way to deflect rape is to turn on 100 per cent, because then there is nothing to rape,” Daedone said at a OneTaste coaching seminar in 2013.

At OneTaste’s New York headquarters in East Harlem on Saturday, Daedone projected confidence and defiance while addressing a group of her supporters. Saying her skill in practicing orgasmic meditation made her akin to a “concert pianist,” Daedone said she was a symbol of “female sexuality and liberation.”

She said she had been “canceled” by the criminal indictment and that her work had been mischaracterised during the trial.

“The only thing I bow to is free will,” Daedone said.

In her closing argument, Nina Gupta, a prosecutor, suggested that Daedone’s doctrine was part of the crime. Daedone, Gupta said, spread her teachings so “her employees would only say yes to her.”

“This case is about a group of women who gave everything to these defendants,” Gupta said. “Their money, their time, their bodies, their dignity and, ultimately, their sanity.”